Class Notes: Before saying goodbye, longtime columnist looks back on his 46-year career in communications

Citizen Contributor,JOE LANDON

1:00 PM, Jun 25, 2014

Joe Landon is seen in this 1983 photo hosting the morning show on WBCK radio, in Battle Creek, Michigan.

Joe Landon poses for a photo with former Gov. Jeb Bush, during the Celebration of Reading event at the Registry Resort in Naples in 2003.

We’d hear fictional TV anchorman Ted Baxter boast that “it all began at a 500-watt radio station” during each episode of “The Mary Tyler Moore Show.” OK, so I’m no Ted Baxter. And it would be more accurate in my case to say it all began with me listening to WLS Chicago disc jockey Dick Biondi on a transistor radio hidden beneath my sheets, well past my bedtime, as a 12-year-old boy in South Bend, Indiana, in May of 1960. I was inspired. I wanted to be on the radio having fun just like my idol, the “Wild Itralian.”

The dream came true on March 1, 1968, at WJRC in Joliet, Illinois, when I hosted my first show on that 500-watt radio station. I was one happy guy. I closed the show with “Sittin’ on the Dock of the Bay” by Otis Redding, the number one song on that particular Saturday afternoon. Over the next 30 years, I’d work at several radio stations, first as a disc jockey, then in various on-air mid-management positions. I would also ply my trade at three TV stations as a news reporter and anchor. It seems I always held two jobs at once, working in TV, for example, while employed by radio stations.

During my career, I did radio interviews with two U.S. presidents before they made it to the White House: Michigan Congressman Jerry Ford three times, and then former CIA Director George H.W. Bush. I covered four vice presidents along the campaign trail. I interviewed radio/TV legends Paul Harvey and Larry King, and sports icons Arnold Palmer, Gordie Howe and Magic Johnson. One of my favorite TV interviewees was Academy Award winning actor Charlton Heston who came to Kalamazoo, Michigan, to take part in a celebrity tennis match in 1977.

Later on, I owned and operated an advertising and public relations agency (Creative Concepts) while serving as operations manager at WBCK in Battle Creek, Michigan. Our top client was the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, for which we produced a 50th anniversary retrospective video in 1980. I reported for the CNN cable network from the World Hot Air Balloon Championship in Battle Creek in 1981 and was named a Billboard magazine program director of the year in ‘85.

Eventually, another dream would come true in November 1985 when I was hired by Liggett Broadcast Group as a radio station general manager. I smiled for a week straight after getting that news. I’d go on to run radio stations in Michigan and Florida for the last 13 years of my broadcasting career (1985-1998). And while managing WMJC, Magic 95 FM in Battle Creek, I fulfilled another dream by teaching communications courses at Kellogg Community College.

Let’s turn the clock ahead to December 7, 1998, my first day on the job as district information officer for Collier County Public Schools. I’ll retire as executive director of communications and community engagement in July.

It seems that everything I’ve done during my 15 years with the district I’d done at some point in my prior life as a broadcaster. The most obvious, of course, managing The Education Channel, Comcast cable 99, our district’s cable access channel. Our “School Zone” TV show tapped skills I’d picked up as a TV news reporter — doing what we call standups, and lots and lots of interviews. Taking into account what we did over the 10-year run of School Zone, and what I did in my radio/TV years, I’ve probably done a thousand interviews. I’ve been master of ceremonies at more events than I can count and have written a ton of different things like news releases, media advisories, articles, presentations, speeches and this column. And in my leisure time, I’ve served two terms as president of the Sunshine State School Public Relations Association (SUNSPRA).

My years of service with the school district have been most enjoyable. I’ve worked for five superintendents and with a bunch of amazing people at the district office and in our schools. They’ve truly put students first. And my, how we’ve grown. In ’98, we had 33 schools and 31,107 students. Today, it’s 50 schools with 44,520 students. My job didn’t exist prior to my arrival. Today, our shop is responsible for all of the district’s communications and public information functions, the website and cable channel, and oversight of the school volunteer program.

The cool thing is, over the entire course of my 46-year career, I’ve so loved what I was doing that it felt like I was being paid to do my hobby — communications — which I remain very passionate about today.

As I officially retire, I’ll keep busy with outside communications projects, but will miss the school people and the students especially. I hope to remain in touch with you right here in the paper. Stay tuned. Take care.

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Joe Landon is the executive director of the Communications and Community Engagement department for the Collier County School District.